Over the past few years, many people have become interested in tracking the amount of CO2 they personally create. For some, CO2 estimates help with making lifestyle changes. For others, the estimates of CO2 output helps in figuring out what carbon offsets to buy.

If you are interested in tracking your real time carbon dioxide output, the Ecorio is a fascinating app for your T-Mobile G1 with Google.

Ecorio is free in the Android Market. It is one of the few apps developed for the environmentalist community.

Automatic Real Time Trip Tracking

Ecorio is a download and forget type of app. In the setup, you set your primary transportation type. Once set, Ecorio periodically checks, using GPS, your location. If you have moved from your initial location, it will calculate the approximate amount of CO2 generated by your primary mode of transportation. Primary modes of transportation can be bicycle, public transportation, or one of a wide range of car makes and models.

If you are one of the many people who use multiple modes of transportation, it is easy to go back in to the day’s trips and re-define the mode of transportation. Although the carbon dioxide emissions are only an estimate, they are a fairly close estimate.

Help in Finding Carpools & Public Transportation Routes

Ecorio has a couple of very useful features for trip planning. For short trips, it links to Google Maps to find the best public transportation route.

Ecorio also ties in to ZimRide, a carpooling community with over 300,000 users. ZimRide allows you to either search for an existing ride or post any trips you are planning. This is a good way to share gas costs on long trips or to look for a ride between cities. A test of a trip from Denver, CO to Seattle, WA produced a good number of possible carpools on a number of different dates.

Inspiration and Offsets

Ecorio is also a social networking site. Using the “inspiration” feature shows short posts from Ecorio users and a map of where they are located.

If you want to offset your carbon emissions, Ecorio offers a number of certified carbon offset projects, including the Chicago Climate Exchange. Offsets can be purchased from your phone. The cost of the offset will depend on the project currently being supported by Ecorio.

Conclusion

Ecorio is an interesting app that helps you to understand your personal impact on carbon dioxide output. It offers some interesting features for reducing the impact, including helping you to locate public transportation routes and carpools. Its links to ZimRide make it the only Android app that can potentially help you get between cities. Supporting certified carbon offset projects makes it a breeze to offset unavoidable CO2 output.

Ecorio is an outstanding application for people interested in learning about, and dealing with, personal carbon dioxide emissions.

Christopher Earle has been working as a freelance writer since 1987. He currently lives in the Denver, Colorado area with his wife, son, and their two cats. He has been a fan of open source software for many years.

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Sean LeRoy

Oh, the long reach of green hysteria! And this company, Ecorio, sells carbon indulgences too?! Neat.

monsieurgrand02

I tried this app a while ago when I first got my G1 and it didn’t work that well. It even started tracking my carbon foot print when I was simply sitting in my chair at home and it started moving down the street.

http://www.andrudes.com Todd A

Looks like a beautiful program. But, I don’t buy into the premise of it.

rta

track your carbon footprint…i.e. run this app which kills your G1′s battery faster requiring it to have more frequent charges requiring more use of electricity requiring you to charge it more … … you get my point.

Rob

This is the most retarded thing I have ever heard of. At our worst, we produced 4% of the entire CO2 emitted into our ozone. Like many multi-billion dollar industries though, they feed off irrational fears.

Global warming is a natural event that we have no control of. This scares us and we look for answers. So much like another fear many of us have (God), we spend money into carbon credits (or into the church) to make ourselves feel better.

I love driving in front of Prius drivers and blipping the throttle on my diesel that spews black soot